‘Red Batter’: Mystery Substance in J.J. Abram’s Star Trek in Reality
Filed under: Alien Intelligence, Aliens, Biology, Black Holes, Interstellar Politics, Movies, Quantum Physics, Science, Science Fiction, Scientific, Star Trek, Star Wars, Strange Matter, Technology, The Future, Wormholes
**** Caution. Possible SPOILER ALERT ****
J.J. Abram’s Star Trek features a Hitchcockian macguffin like few we’ve ever seen before. It’s a mysterious substance referred to as ‘red batter’ by the film’s villain, Romulan Captain Nero. Now, there is some debate right now over whether Nero called it ‘red batter’ OR ‘red matter’, but for the sake of giving this amazing substance more identity, we’re calling it ‘red batter’.
‘Red batter’ has the ability to reduce itself and matter around it into a singularity at a rapid, exponential rate. As a bomb explodes on impact, ‘red batter’ gravitationally sucks in everything around it on impact. The end result is that most awesome of interstellar objects, the fearsome black hole.
In J.J. Abram’s Star Trek, Captain Nero uses the ‘red batter’ (or ‘red matter’) to create a black hole in the center of Spock’s home world Vulcan. This black hole devours the planet in a matter of minutes in a sequence that is, in our opinion, much more terrifying than Star War’s Death Star’s planet destroying laser beam could ever be.
Besides creating black holes, the ‘red batter’ can also affect time travel. If you’ve seen the new Star Trek, you’ll know what I’m talking about.
Could such a matter exist in reality? Perhaps. A recent study, which you can read more about here, suggests that all particles are miniature black holes. IF this is the case, than it is probable that there is a catalyst which would enable these miniature black holes, which are everything, to coalesce together at an exponential rate to create a rapidly growing black hole that devours everything in its path.
Could the Large Hadron Collider be a catalyst for such a reaction? If so, what sort of defenses have we put in place?
And did Captain Nero say ‘red batter’ or ‘red batter’? Personally, we think ‘red batter has a nicer ring to it. What do you think?
Real Life Star Trek: DARPA Rewards VULCAN Engine Contracts
Filed under: Future Weapons, Outer Space, Science, Science Fiction, Technology, The Future
Right before the release of J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency kicks off their VULCAN Engine Program by rewarding four contractors with funding to begin first phase development of the proposed super engine system.
When we hear the word Vulcan, our thoughts wander to the Star Trek character Spock, his home planet, and his people. The VULCAN Engine Program is appropriately named since it is a “propulsion system demonstration effort to design, build, and ground-test an engine capable of accelerating a full-scale hypersonic vehicle from rest to Mach 4+.”
This could be our first steps towards a “warp drive” propulsion system like the one that propels the Enterprise across vast distances in space.
Read the DARPA News Release here (via DARPA’s news room.)